


Confiding

by iceberry



Category: Inazuma Eleven
Genre: Coming Out, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-14
Updated: 2014-06-14
Packaged: 2018-02-04 14:59:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1783186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iceberry/pseuds/iceberry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No one ever said talking about dating more than one person was going to be easy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Confiding

Gouenji glances over at Yuuka for what’s probably the tenth time in the past few minutes. He’s not sure why he expects her to get up from her spot at the kitchen table – she’s had her nose buried in a book for the past 45 minutes, and hasn’t spoken a word except to ask him what time their dad was going to be home. And even then she had went right back to reading again, which Gouenji couldn’t help but smile at. She’s been reading more and more lately, which was unexpected (considering how much she complains about school) but nice.

It’s been a few years since she started school again but… sometimes it’s the little things her brother is most thankful for, those small symbols of normalcy that she missed out on while in the hospital. And though he knows it’s just an excuse, part of him is wondering if his hesitance with this conversation is because he doesn’t want to disturb that. He looks away from her and back at the TV; even though it’s on, it’s little more than background noise to everything else going through his mind.

Gouenji scarcely has more than a few seconds to stare anxiously at the TV before his attention is pulled away. His phone vibrates against the side of his leg, and when he opens the message Endou’s sent he sighs in resignation. The simple “how’d it go?,” (coupled with an email from Aphrodi that he’d left open demanding that he and Endou get on to video chat once Gouenji had finished) drives the point in that it probably isn’t helping at all putting this off any longer.

He slips his phone back into his pocket, wipes his palms (slightly sweaty from nervousness) on his pants, and grabs the TV clicker. As he stands up and turns it off, he finally breaks the silence between him and his sister. “Hey, Yuuka… can I talk to you for a bit?” Gouenji rounds the couch as she looks up from her book questioningly.

“I guess so,” she says, trying to sound bored, but there’s a definite layer of curiosity beneath it. Carefully, she pulls out a bookmark from the front of it and marks her spot, then closes the book and lays it down in front of her. She rests her shoulders on the table, props her chin up with her hands, and looks at her brother expectantly.

“Do you want anything to drink?” he asks, feeling a little bad for making her wait – it _is_ just him stalling, after all.

Yuuka looks at him quizzically, and tosses one of her braids back over her shoulder while she talks. “Do we have any orange juice?”

Gouenji makes a small noise of acknowledgement as he grabs the aforementioned juice from the fridge and opens the cabinet. The striker reaches for one glass, but grabs two at the last minute. “So, Yuuka…” he starts as he fills both glasses and carries them over to the table, placing them down and pulling out a chair for himself. He takes a deep breath. “Do you remember how a few weeks ago you kept asking me why Endou and Aphrodi come over so often?”

As he sits down, she reaches across and grabs the glass that’s slightly fuller. “I guess so? I’ve asked that a _buncha_ times y’know,” Yuuka adds matter-of-factly.

There’s a pause, the quiet only punctuated by the sound of Yuuka taking a sip of her juice and putting the cup back down. Gouenji brushes some of the drops of condensation off of his glass with his thumb, thinking. It’s not like he hasn’t rehearsed this in his head a hundred times over, but all the scripted conversations aren’t really working for him, so he decides to do something uncharacteristic for him – he wings it.

“A ‘guess so’ will have to do I guess,” he says with a small smile. “Anyways… you know how dad talks about how he feels about mom?” It’s kind of a risky leap on his part, because he’s never certain how to handle talking about their mom with his younger sister. _He_ has few memories of her, despite how much longer he knew her. Yuuka was even younger, barely 2 when she died, but she’s understood what happened for a while now. It’s been almost 8 years since it happened, but it’s still a difficult topic.

“Don’t talk to me like I’m a baby, I know what ‘love’ is.” She’s giving him such an exasperated, disdainful look that he can’t help but smile a bit. In typical preteen girl fashion, despite her exasperated expression and her head resting in her hands, there’s still a glimmer of curiosity behind her dark eyes. “But I don’t quite get what it has to do with…” She trails off, and all the concentration she’s been putting into looking bored fades away. After a few seconds, something clicks, and she suddenly sits up straight looking both confused and interested. “What?! _Seriously?_ ”

Though there’s something in her tone that he can’t quite pinpoint, he incredulous look she gives her brother is met only with a small nervous smile. He’s relieved that Yuuka was smart enough that he didn’t have to spell it out – but he’s quiet, and unsure how to elaborate or keep going. Yuuka saves him the trouble. She takes a couple of deep breaths, as if trying to compose herself, and looks the blond right in the eyes again.

“Aren’t only two people supposed to…be together?” she asks after a moment of staring. It’s a genuine question with no malice behind it, and only a slight layer of (poorly faked) loftiness. Bringing her glass up to her lips, she takes another sip of her juice, and manages to do it without losing eye contact.

Shuuya shifts nervously for a second, but manages to keep up the sheepish smile. “Well, a lot of people think that. It’s not necessarily true.” His words are carefully chosen; Yuuka may be smart for her age, but he doesn’t want to make this any more complicated than it is.

“Why not?”

“Well, because-“

“Doesn’t it matter that you’re all boys?”

“No. Do you think it should?”

Yuuka looks a bit more concerned now, though she’s clearly trying to hide it. “Not really, I guess.” The brunette sounds a lot less confident now, and though she’s still maintaining eye contact, one of her hands has started fiddling with one of her braids. “I know that a lot of people do think it matters, though.” Gouenji at the very least _expected_ something like this, but once again, he’s at a loss of what to do, exactly. None of the scripted conversations he’d gone through mentally really made this any easier after all. His protective instincts are all crying out that he should be trying to ease her worries, but _how_?

“Are you okay?” It’s a start.

“Yes. Well, okay, _maybe_ , kind of?” She bites her lip, and looks away for a minute, not saying anything. The neat braid is beginning to look a little more mussed up from her fiddling with it, and Gouenji has half a mind to reach over and still her hand so she doesn’t tangle it up - but suddenly she lets it drop back onto her shoulder, and nearly _slaps_ the table with her palm as she turns back to him – he expects her to start shouting angrily, but instead, she relaxes after another moment. But Yuuka still looks more distressed than before, and her bottom lip is quivering a bit.

“It’s just so _weird_! I mean, I’d kinda guessed that there was _something_ funny like this with you guys – I mean, you aren’t very good at hiding it, sorry –  but hearing you _say it_ is completely different! I didn’t even know that was a thing that could happen for real and thought maybe I was thinking wrong, you know, and a lot of people don’t like the idea of boys being together to begin with, and now suddenly…” As she runs out of breath (she _is_ practically yelling, after all), she trails off, but takes a deep breath and starts again, looking almost like she’s going to cry. “Aren’t people gonna be angry at you guys, Shuuya?”

Her brother inhales sharply out of surprise, but the exhale is accompanied by a warm smile. “Yuuka…” Of all the things she could’ve been upset by about this – him keeping secrets, him being into guys, almost anything else - she’s _worried_ for them. Gouenji forgets so often that she’s incredibly mature for a ten year old; she was forced to grow up faster than most little kids were. (In the end, however, she’s still a ten year-old girl.)

“Why are you giving me that look?” she demands, the rapid blinking betraying the fact that she’s trying to hold back tears. Gouenji wants to reach over and hug her, but decides to hold off on it for the time being.

He’s _touched_ by her concern, though. They’ve always been close, but Yuuka’s growing up (as foreign and unwelcome as that seems to him), and with him going off to college in the near future, the things they share have been harder and harder to hold on to. Of course, coming out to your ten year-old sister as both gay _and_ polyamorous isn’t exactly anyone’s idea of quality family time, he feels a new sense of appreciation for his sister. It’s not that she doesn’t have a point – there’s still several of their friends who don’t know, and others have had reactions that’ve been far from ideal – but it was something they’d known was going to happen from the moment they got together.

“We’re gonna be fine, don’t worry.” He gives her the warmest, most reassuring smile he can and reaches across the table to muss up her hair, but doesn’t fight too much when she knocks his hand away indignantly.

A few minutes later, she’s composed herself to the point that if anyone walked in, they wouldn’t be able to tell that she’d been upset at all before. They’ve been in a comfortable silence all that time, Shuuya leaning back in his chair. His arms are behind his back as he looks up at the ceiling, both relieved and _still_ a little emotional (not that he’d let Yuuka see that).

Yuuka takes a few more deep breaths, drinks the last of her orange juice, and talks again.

“Why?”

Gouenji leans forward again, dragging his gaze from the ceiling to his sister. He looks at her quizzically, expecting her to continue – but she’s looking at him with an expectant expression as well. “Do you mean why we’re together?” The brunette nods once, bangs bobbing with her head. He doesn’t respond right away.

It’s not that Gouenji doesn’t know what to say, it’s that he doesn’t know where to begin. He could try to give her the brief story of how they met, perhaps. Though maybe that’s not the best impression to give her, he thinks as he remembers that first encounter – Aphrodi showing up out of nowhere simply to try and intimidate the team. (It worked). Or maybe the striker could skip forward to when they actually officially got together, in the chaotic few weeks after they’d beaten Aliea. (He smiles, remembering the frantic phone call from Mamoru apologizing for kissing Aphrodi, the next morning on the field and it being _his_ turn to kiss Zeus’ captain.) But even that would take too long to explain – maybe just tell her the way that they make him happy, happier than almost anything else in the world; or how they’re the only two people outside of his family that he _knows_ he’d be lost without. Or maybe the way that it’s the small things – like him sleeping between them, Endou pressed against his back and Terumi tucked under his arm, how sweet Aphrodi’s voice can be when they’re alone, how Endou just _knows_ what he’s feeling – that really make it worthwhile.

In the end, he keeps it simple.

“Because we love each other, of course.”

He smiles at her, and Yuuka blinks and looks away, but remains silent. He wishes he could tell what she’s thinking so hard about; her extreme focus is kind of amusing, in an endearing way.

“Hey,” she says suddenly, quiet as he’s ever heard her and far from the boisterous girl she usually is. “Does that mean I could date two girls if I wanted to, if we all loved each other?”

Now this time Gouenji can’t help but laugh out loud, which is met of course, by another indignant look from Yuuka – but he can tell she’s not really trying too hard this time. “Only if I approve of them,” he says with a smile, but becomes joke-serious a second later. “And not until you’re 30.”

“You’re only 17!”

“Almost 18. And sorry, I don’t make the rules.” He reaches over to finish his juice, but pauses when the glass is less than an inch from his lips when he notices her getting up from her chair. He drops “Hey, uh… you can keep this from dad for now, right?”

As she grabs her book, Yuuka rolls her eyes at him like he’s just asked the most absurd question possible. “Obviously,” she responds, seemingly annoyed at how much effort she has to put in just to respond with those 4 syllables.

“Thanks,” Shuuya says, voice as genuine as possible. “You’re a really great sister, you know.” And he means it. She blushes a bit, and turns away from him as she starts walking towards her room.

But there’s a much more devious look on her face when she turns towards him a final time. A pause, as though she’s deliberating on something – and then a grin.

“I guess that explains that one time I saw you sleeping naked with them, too,” she says sing-song, smug as can be. It takes all of Gouenji’s self-control to not spit orange juice everywhere, and by the time he’s swallowed it and recovered enough to talk, she’s almost all the way across the apartment, giggling the whole way over.

“Hold on! Yuuka, _wait_ , when did you?! Yuuka, come back here right now! _Yuuka!_ ”  

**Author's Note:**

> so i wrote this one, for practice, and two, because i wanted to try and think about the ship outside of the context of it just being? a relationship between them. probably gonna be a multi-part fic looking at different perspectives off this stuff!!


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